Robert Osborne

Journalist and Diver

Robert Osborne is first a foremost a passionate storyteller. For past 29 years he’s worked as a journalist for every major network in Canada as both a producer and reporter. For 17 years he was the Senior Field Producer for the CTV documentary program W5. As part of that job he’s travelled around the world filming stories that took him from the depths of Conception Bay to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro, from Haiti’s slums to Rodeo Drive. He’s met mob bosses and movie stars, rubbed elbows with the famous and infamous.

Along the way he’s indulged in his second passion—scuba diving. That began in 1971 when he was 16 years old when he checked a book out of the local library called The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau. Within months of reading that book he’d certified as a NAUI open water diver with the Lahr Sub Aqua Club in West Germany. Since then he’s gone on to explore extreme diving: pushing the boundaries of diving to the depths of Florida’s underwater caves and the wrecks of the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.

Nine years ago, Robert decided to start to combine his two passions So he began to write articles for diving magazines. Since then he’s been a regular contributor to Diver Magazine, Scuba Diving Magazine, Diver UK, AOL Travel, Xray-Magazine, as well as newspapers like The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star and National Post. Robert has also managed to direct, write, and host several underwater documentaries.

For the past few years Robert has entered into the digital domain, travelling and writing about his underwater explorations. What attracts him to this medium is the immediacy with which his experience can be shared. Ultimately that’s what led him to the Huffington Post—a desire to be able to communicate his observations and epiphanies with the stoke of a key.

Robert is currently working as a Senior Producer for Dam Builder Productions managing a web site for the CBC and working on a documentary for The Nature of Things. He is an Associate Editor for Xray Magazine and still writes articles for Diver Magazine.

The mine's tunnels stretch for hundreds of kilometres under the island and adjacent bay. The last miner walked out in the mid 1960s leaving most of their equipment and tools behind. When the mine was shut down, the pumps were turned off and it flooded. Eventually the water levels rose, covering more than a hundred years of mining history.

Lionfish may be one of the most truly beautiful creatures you'll encounter when you're scuba diving or snorkelling in tropical water. There's nothing wrong with lionfish where they're indigenous -- the Indian and Pacific Ocean. But about 20 years ago a few started to appear in the Caribbean.

You wouldn't believe the looks of disbelief that we get. When my dive buddy Chris and I decide to spend a morning in Humber Bay, people are apt to ask whether we're serious about swimming in that part of Lake Ontario. One person questioned our sanity.

(Photos by Jill Heinerth courtesy of Dam Builder Productions) Last August I wrote an article about the death of Carlos Fonseca. He was a dynamic diver and someone whom I was just getting to know as a...

Driven by the taste for shark fin soup, long line fisherman around the world are eliminating some 100 million sharks per year -- a reduction, in some cases of 90 per cent of the species. Sharks, being apex predators, breed very slowly. The inevitable result of all that fishing is a complete extinction of many shark species within the next ten years according to Sharkwater.com.

As a diver, I've been a witness to one of the most important environmental battles that's taking place on this planet. Sadly, it's a battle that most people will never see and many may never hear about. That's because the battlefront is often 20 metres under the water.

I know some of you might say that they have the black box that will guide them by electronic signal if they get close enough. True, but the batteries will run out in a matter of days and meanwhile even with all the ships and planes that have flooded into the area, there's a massive area to search.

"Throw those curtains wide, one day like this a year'd see me right..." - Guy Garvey To describe Porteau Cove on British Columbia's west coast as stunningly beautiful is to do it a disservice. It's th...

"Futures uncertain and the end is always near." Jim Morrison On a sunny day in mid-July, when the air is warm and the water is a deep topaz blue its pretty hard to not completely love the Village of T...

I was shocked when I heard about the death of my friend Carlos Fonseca two weeks ago. He was in Ginnie Springs, Florida about to start exploring a cave system called The Devil's Spring. The following day rumours started to circulate on a couple of diving forums that Carlos had died while inside the system. How he died is not really known.

Zebra Mussel filter millions of gallons of water; it's how they feed. The result, the once soup-like Great Lakes are now crystal clear. That doesn't mean the water is unpolluted, far from it. Their output is crystal clear, which for divers is a definite plus. So you see, from a certain perspective, what started as a natural disaster has a definite upside. Now, I know some might argue that learning to love environmental disasters requires a very self-centered attitude. What I celebrate, others revile. I look forward to figuring out what new and clever angle I can come up with the next time we lay waste to some pristine wilderness area.

A few days ago my friend invited me to go diving with a group of disabled divers. He told me that one group member, Harry, is a quadriplegic who is one of the best divers he's ever trained. Harry can't use his legs. He has limited use of his arms. But he can control his buoyancy and trim, and with those two tools he rides the currents like a sea otter.